Utilities.
We’ve worked with some of the leading brands in the utilities sector over the past 17 years. We’ve developed digital strategy, products and campaigns for the likes of npower, South West Water and Viridor.
The digital transformation of the utilities industry
The energy and water industries have come a long way in their adoption of digital technologies in the past 10 years.
The opening up of free competition in the energy markets, and more latterly the start of this with water companies have helped drive the digital disruption we’ve seen recently. Switching rates in the energy sector have steadily increased year-on-year and the use of digital in the utilities industry has made this easier for consumers to do.
At the same time, we’ve seen new entrants and the disruption of the ‘big 6’ in energy terms and again digital, app based services have played an ever more important role here in making the customer experience for utilities more efficient and simple. Frictionless digital account management is almost expected now in the innovative digital first utility market.
There’s still room for more digital disruption to the market
Whilst digital is making the customer experience with their own providers easier, there’s still a gap in using digital to research and engage with other providers.
Research shows that only 34% of consumers switch regularly. Inertia is still high in a low interest category. Coupled with this, according to a recent study, 41% still find it more difficult to connect digitally with their utilities providers than other sectors, and fewer than half of customers are in fact using digital to contact them. But the benefit for the providers is clear to see. Not only are there hefty penalties from Ofgem and Ofwat for those who don’t get digital customer service right, but there are also clear rewards. Digitally engaged customers are more likely to be more loyal, have better levels of customer satisfaction and trust their provider more than those not.
Using digital to overcome competition in the energy market
The real opportunity is for utilities providers to really embrace multi-channel customer service, seek excellence in digital customer experience and consider how their community engagement and education programmes can be enhanced by it.
We’ve created digital strategies, products, and campaigns for challenger energy brands such as Ovo and Ecotricity, and worked with npower for over 10 years, We’ve also worked with Rentokil, South West Water and Viridor.
